In Thy Name
by scifiromance
Summary: Seven's health takes a life-threatening turn at the worst possible time, leaving her husband and extended Voyager family to struggle with heartbreaking decisions. Even one last miracle may come with its own costs... C/7. Unaltered Endgame timeline AU.
1. Prologue: In Sickness

_Captain's Log Supplemental, Stardate 58519.8: As noted in my main log, today, at 1804 hours, we finally reached the rendezvous point with the Borg Resistance vessel. General Korok, he may be Klingon but he's still managed to maintain some sense of efficiency, was already there waiting, though in a different Cube than the one we helped him seize, the one which was briefly my home, four years ago. Thankfully, he beamed over at once with his best doctor, or I suppose you could call her an engineer since she deals mostly in repairing Borg implants at this point, a Vulcan named T'Nara. They went straight to Sickbay, we've been in contact so often now that they didn't need a debriefing, and have been assessing Seven's condition now for almost five hours. I've just been summoned to Sickbay, hopefully to receive the first good news since the baby was born. T'Nara seems willing to begin the operation at once, but the Doctor seems wary and wants to study the replacement cortical array more closely before proceeding. I suppose I can't blame him, considering that it's Seven's life that's on the line, but she's been hanging on by a thread for six months now. For myself, a large part of me wants to know either way, if we can continue with these life prolonging efforts or if we have to let her go and grieve, and I've always suspected Chakotay has felt that way, whatever it's cost him emotionally. End log._

* * *

Sickbay's lights were on their dimmed, night time setting, despite the number of people crowded inside as Captain Janeway too entered. It didn't take her eyes long to adjust, the lighting suited the taut, sombre mood; it was what she saw that knocked the wind out of her completely. For a few suspenseful seconds she convinced herself she was too far from the biobed to judge properly, and thus moved from the doorway to the back of the room, where the most secluded biobed and thus the Doctor's longest-term patient were located, but unfortunately as she approached she saw that her eyes had not deceived her. "A ventilator?" she choked out, a new wave of devastation surging over her despite the fact that she'd been telling herself that Seven's death was likely for months now even as she searched for help. "Has the cortical array shut down to the point where she can't even breathe independently now? I thought it was stable enough to perform at least those basic autonomic functions…"

The Doctor merely turned his face away from her, his lips pressing together in distress. It was T'Nara, the willowy dark-skinned Vulcan, who looked up from her medical tricorder to glance Janeway's way. "The cortical array is in the same state it has been since this problem began, I wouldn't define that as functional, but yes we've transferred all the functions it was still performing for her body to external systems." Though her face remained impassive as Janeway flinched, she obviously felt it was logical to explain. "In order to conduct the cortical array transplant, the one she has must be removed, and in her weakened state that would kill Seven of Nine instantaneously. By transferring her life support to a heart and lung machine we can ensure she stays alive both during the transplant and then while her implants are adapting to the new array." Her tone dropped, revealing conviction for the first time, "We are attempting to give her the best chance of surviving intact Captain."

Janeway's gaze flickered to Chakotay, sitting hunched over the biobed, his knees crammed against it, the narrow slab that had become Seven's world and so by extension his, gently caressing his wife's limp and unresponsive human hand, his thumb occasionally grazing her wedding ring which was now loose on her withered fingers. Although he'd been vocal, passionately and desperately so, while they'd been trying to ensure the Resistance's help for Seven, now that that help had come he seemed incapable of interacting with it. So instead his Captain took it upon herself to question the situation, "She may survive, she's been alive through this whole ordeal, but will she regain consciousness?"

The Doctor spoke up now, his voice husky. "We believe so Captain. As I've explained there hasn't been significant damage to her brain that I can find, but her human physiology and her Borg technology are so interconnected that one cannot function without the other, losing the majority of function in her cortical array thus left her comatose."

Janeway swallowed hard, "I still don't fully understand Doctor, when her original cortical node began to fail she was going to die within days before Icheb intervened, but she was never rendered comatose like this…"

"That instance was more acute, and I've studied more about cortical arrays and cortical nodes since then, this deterioration has been gradual, not a complete shut down."

Janeway bowed her head, tempted for a moment to look towards Sickbay's other occupant, but instead kept her eyes on Seven. "Was it the strain of pregnancy that caused the deterioration?" she asked thickly, "She was fine before…"

"It was a factor." T'Nara cut her off coolly, "Perhaps to use the human phrase, 'the last straw', but I believe, from what the Resistance has experienced, that the Doctor's procedure to bypass the emotional fail-safe in her cortical node compromised her entire cortical array. I am surprised she managed to fully function for three years in that state."

"I exchanged one ticking time bomb for another one when I conducted that operation." The Doctor ground out, his fists clenched at his sides.

A violent shudder visibly shook Chakotay's frame as he turned to the Doctor with dark, hooded eyes, underscored by the purple bruises of exhaustion. "Would you prefer that she never got to experience the fullness of humanity?" He croaked out, shaking his head as the Doctor took a step back from him, contradicting himself before the Doctor could, "She'd be awake then…" He unconsciously switched the hand which was holding hers, her right hand in his left, the matching glint of their wedding rings taunting him, "…but maybe not really alive either."

"No, she wouldn't be." The Captain agreed more resolutely.

Korok nodded, his forehead ridges, still particularly prominent since he'd yet to regain his full mane of hair, knotting together as he frowned. "Fate has dealt her a cruel hand, but her warrior's spirit is battling to defeat that fate. It is unfortunate though that she received her first transplant from another child drone as she herself was."

The Doctor's head pivoted round to him, "Why?" he demanded, though his voice was full of dread.

"The emotional failsafe is a component unique to child drones." T'Nara explained, "Such intricate manipulation of the brain is only possible at an immature stage."

"Of course!" The Doctor exclaimed, "Children don't have fully development emotional control systems…"

"And such control of the drones raised in the Collective raises their perfection." Korok muttered, "Their methods know no bounds, but at least the Resistance have also perfected cortical arrays designed for transplant, we can thwart them!"

Janeway smiled faintly at the bombastic pride in his voice. "Thank you again General, for coming to our aid. I know you're still fully engaged in your guerrilla war against the Borg, and intercepting with us has meant a huge detour and a five month journey…"

Korok regarded her, bristling with offence. "It would've been dishonourable to do otherwise Captain." He responded seriously, "Without the intervention of both Seven of Nine and your vessel we would've been slaughtered by the Collective. Axum, though too distant to come to her aid as he wished to, made the strongest possible argument possible that we should do all we can to save his mate…" He cleared his throat with a mildly embarrassed glance at Chakotay through furrowed brows, one bushy, one starkly metallic, "…his former mate."

Janeway looked towards Chakotay in concern, but the broken man didn't even react to the mention of his wife's lost love. T'Nara, ignoring the awkwardness of the moment, added smoothly, "It was our only logical course of action Captain, even for the morale of the Resistance alone without the emotional factors, Seven of Nine, or Annika Hansen as she is still commonly known, is an icon amongst us. News of her death at the Collective's hands would devastate many beyond Voyager."

"Of course." Janeway replied stiltedly before her voice was sharpened by pain, "When can you perform the procedure?"

T'Nara looked towards the Doctor, who replied with a somewhat reluctant nod. "We will proceed from 0700 hours. I require a full regeneration cycle to be at my full capacity."

"We have alcoves available in Cargo Bay 2." The Captain said, almost without thinking, then grimaced. That Cargo Bay had served as Seven's quarters, her personal space, though she and Icheb had happily shared in latter years, right up until her wedding day.

T'Nara gave her head a gentle shake, "I appreciate the offer Captain, but I will return to the Cube."

"Fine." Janeway agreed tiredly, moving timidly towards the biobed as T'Nara and Korok both moved aside to update their vessel on the situation via Sickbay's comm. access console. Despite this new hive of activity forming and buzzing around her, the centre of it all, Seven herself, remained oblivious, cut off. The golden locks which had once been her crowning glory after a lifetime of the Borg stripping her femininity had been shorn within two weeks of her collapse, to make caring for her easier. The downy layer of dried out, colour sapped hair still feathering her scalp emphasised how much her fine features had been blurred, like water causing streaks in a fresh painting. The pregnancy had filled out her face in some respects, but the ashen tint to her skin disguised any glow lingering hormones might've brought out. If anything, the changes brought on by pregnancy, such as the bloating or the recently deflated stomach, only made the deterioration throughout her body starker; the stick thin arms, the shrunken shoulders, the loose, unresponsive face. The Doctor had assured her that Seven hadn't been losing weight, counterintuitive though that concern might've seemed in a heavily pregnant then post partum woman, but any tone in her once athletic muscles had completely gone. The feeding tube, which until tonight had been the main medical intervention, hadn't been able to prevent that kind of wastage. Now of course, the biobed was surrounded by new machines, many glowering with the sickly green light synonymous with the Borg, each with its own winding tube or wire cutting into Seven's helpless form.

Janeway tentatively placed a hand on Chakotay's shoulder as they both stared down at Seven. "It…it seems more real now somehow." She murmured shakily as she forced her unwilling eyes to absorb the sight of a full breathing tube down Seven's throat, her face almost completely obscured by the multiple apparatus. "Before today I could almost convince myself she was just sleeping."

Chakotay's eyes closed even as he stiffened, shrugging off her comforting hand as he repudiated her words, "Seven's never looked like she was sleeping here." He countered hoarsely, his voice soon diminishing into a barely audible whisper, "She's peaceful when she sleeps, or expressive…" He trailed off, thinking about the treasured moments he'd drowsily watched her sleep as they lay in bed. Such times had been rare, Seven always seemed to know when he was studying her like that, but he'd been able to see that she was often more expressive in her dream world than she allowed herself to be in real life, quicker to smile, or frown, or tear up. Right now he'd do anything to see her arching her eyebrow at him, or smirking as they threw their own style of banter back and forth, but most of all he wanted to see that surprised, grateful glimmer that entered her eyes whenever she laughed, that impulse could still catch her unawares.

"I'm sorry." The Captain replied heavily, raising her voice in a subconscious attempt to drown out the mechanical rasp of the ventilator, but it was inescapable.

Korok's deliberately strong footfalls echoed behind them. "The crew within the Cube are in agreement with our plan, T'Nara will return to the ship to regenerate and gather together the last of her equipment before she comes back here to begin the operation with the Doctor at 0700 hours.

"More equipment?" Janeway echoed falteringly as her eyes again skimmed over the crowd of machines that surrounded Seven's biobed, leaving hardly any room for someone to sit at her bedside, through Chakotay had made sure to remain stationed there as people had milled around him all day.

"As I'm sure Seven of Nine has told you before, Borg scanning equipment is more accurate than what Voyager possesses." T'Nara remarked.

Janeway smiled sadly, "Yes, she has made that point on more than one occasion." She conceded, "We'll make sure all of your necessary equipment is accommodated."

T'Nara responded with a polite nod, "Thank you Captain. If everything goes smoothly then I have reasonable confidence in our success and thus Seven's recovery."

"That's good to hear." The Captain replied, her spirits bolstered, "I'm sure Seven is glad to hear it too." At Korok's confused grunt she explained, "She's had consistent levels of brain activity, and all of our medical science leads us to believe that coma patients have some capacity to hear…"

"I hope she can't." Chakotay ground out suddenly.

Janeway and the Doctor turned to him in bewilderment; they'd both heard him speaking to his wife, for long stretches each day since she'd been struck down. He'd even used his medicine wheel to guide her spirit, as B'Elanna had for him years ago. "What do you mean by that Chakotay?" Janeway questioned tightly, her voice fraying with the stress she was under.

"Because we haven't talked about what we're going to do if this doesn't work, and I don't want her to hear that." Chakotay answered hoarsely, his gaze focusing again on the hand he held rather than those shocked faces around him, "You know that Seven would say we're ignoring the obvious. If we fail…"

"I don't think any of us have hung on this long just to give up…" Janeway choked out harshly after a long, torturous pause to collect her scattered thoughts.

"I don't intend to fail Commander, you know that." The Doctor cut in heatedly, "You're forgetting that we have the expertise of an entire Cube of former drones at our disposal now, we may be able to plan another treatment…"

"And for how long would we pursue that?" Chakotay muttered darkly, "A month? A year? A decade?" He spat out the last one and Janeway flinched back, hearing the reference to Voyager's long journey. He stood up abruptly, but immediately wobbled on unsteady feet, bracing himself on the biobed as he stared them down with deadened eyes, "You told me Doctor, before we contacted the Resistance, that there was hardly hope, that if there wasn't the baby to think of…" He choked on whatever his next words were but recovered, "What's changed if this fails? I _knew _that she'd do anything to save the baby, that's how I justified this…" He gestured weakly at the lifeless form on the biobed but his eyes were aflame with powerful agony, "But do you really think Seven would want to keep living…existing like this? It's not fair to inflict this on her just because I can't let go…" A sob broke free of his constricted throat and his knees started to buckle, "How am I supposed to explain to our daughter that I allowed her mother to endure this beyond what she ever would've wanted…"

It was Korok who moved forward to hold him up, grasping him by the elbows as his friends drew back, too stricken themselves to offer even physical support. Korok however, met the Starfleet Commander's eyes with new and certain respect. "There comes a point where releasing someone is the only option available to maintain their integrity and honour. Only you can decide when that time comes, but know that Annika's entrance into Sto'Vo'Kor is guaranteed by her honourable life as well as her death."

Janeway grimaced, though she knew that Korok had meant his words as kind reassurance and could see that Chakotay was taking it as such, but personally she didn't see the viewpoint of a Klingon, raised in a culture that accepted ritual suicide, as applicable in this situation, however painfully Chakotay's points hit home. Her heart began to hammer through her ears to the extent that she utterly ignored Seven's daughter's thin, unsettled cries until they were strengthened by an awareness of hunger. Dazed, she turned to glance vaguely at the incubator, which Chakotay was already stumbling tiredly towards. "B'Elanna or Sam would be happy to attend to her Chakotay…" She advised him sharply, seized with an irrational, impotent anger towards the man to the point where she didn't want him near the child.

Chakotay answered without pausing to look at her. "Not tonight Kathryn."

The anger drained out of her as soon as it had come, pity and sorrow filling the void left behind. Chakotay definitely _had _lost weight, his uniform hung off his gaunt frame. In many ways his physical deterioration mirrored his wife's, and the emotions she'd been robbed of pressed down on him. B'Elanna had confided that she suspected Chakotay's depression had actually deepened since his daughter's birth; through he'd utterly broken down with relief on the day. Janeway could only suppose it was reality hitting him now, the cycle of suspended grief and tortured hope coming home to roost.

T'Nara turned to her holographic colleague curiously, "Our crew were asking for a report on the welfare of the child…"

The Doctor tried to maintain a smile, a little pride entering his eyes. "She'll be a week old tomorrow. I performed the caesarean just over three weeks early; I didn't want to risk nature jumping the gun. She's a little underweight, but otherwise she's on track to be perfectly healthy." He lowered his voice, "In all honesty Doctor T'Nara, I think Seven's cortical array's activity being so minimal, and thus her nanoprobes inactive, probably saved the health of the baby…"

"That would make sense." T'Nara agreed solemnly.

Korok approached them, having overheard the report on the baby. "Does she have a designation worthy of her house?" He didn't seem to notice how Borg phrasing affected a typical Klingon sentiment.

"We've been calling her Annika, Anni, so far…informally." The Doctor replied awkwardly, "None of us were sure how Seven would like having a namesake, but it seemed appropriate. If she doesn't like it when she comes round tomorrow, then I'm sure Chakotay would be happy to change it."

"I hope they do not change it." Korok opined, unable to stop himself from putting his two cents in, "It is an honourable name, and I'm sure the mother will see that when she wakes, or the father will appreciate the remembrance in time. The Resistance will certainly approve."

"Logically our approval should not feature high in their list of priorities." T'Nara reminded Korok, "Seven's recovery, if the operation is successful, will be psychological as well as physical."

**A/n: Yes, it's dark so far, but please review. I intend to prioritise this story, 'The Girl Next Door', 'The Gift' and 'Come Away with Me in the Night' for the rest of the term, so my other stories probably won't be updated until I'm on my Easter break and have more time, but have no fear, uni breaks for the holiday on the 28****th**** of this month, whew, so you won't be waiting too long. ;) **


	2. Seven of Nine Point Five

_**Three Years Earlier…**_

Chakotay sighed deeply as he looked around his quarters. They weren't perfect, not by a long shot. He'd always been tidy to the point of being minimalistic, he'd had to be when living in the cramped confines of the Valjean, but as neat and well-ordered as the place was, an air of disuse permeated the room that he hadn't noticed before. It looked like what it was, a pit stop where he paused to sleep, shower, eat his meals when he had replicator rations, and then would hurriedly leave for more important stomping grounds. A bachelor pad in all but name. Only the mercifully pleasant smells floating over from the kitchenette's tiny oven brought a smile of hopeful satisfaction to his lips. However, it also brought the uncomfortably nerve-wracking realisation that he couldn't remember the last time he'd had a meal, tête-à-tête, in here. He ate with the Captain weekly, but that was always on her terms, on the home ground of her quarters, a time when they tried to stitch together old wounds in their relationship that may have opened in the past week with the skin deep balm of light chatter. Necessary, often pleasant enough, but far from relaxing either.

"Computer, dim the lights in my quarters by thirty per cent." He ordered quietly, smiling in wry relief as the change of lighting, cliché though it was, softened the ambience of the room considerably and put him a little more at ease. He knew that anyone privy to his thoughts and situation at that moment would've raised their eyebrows, after all, his guest, his _date_, had a Cargo Bay for her quarters, but they hadn't experienced the comfort, the freedom and ease, he'd felt when he'd been shown to a private corner of that Cargo Bay for a picnic arranged by, he now suspected, the most earnest and open-hearted woman he'd ever known…

The flicker of the red numerals of his wall clock got his attention as they showed precisely 1900 hours. He hastily wiped his suddenly moist hands on his trousers and took a deep breath as he pre-empted her arrival by heading for the door, he knew her well enough by now to know she'd be punctual, but what actually happened next taught him once again to always expect surprises.

Instead of the anticipated ring of the doorbell, the insistent buzz of the transporter filled his ears and with the briefest flash of white light, Seven of Nine's unmistakable figure appeared directly before him, standing so close that the bunch of flowers she held innocuously in one hand almost brushed against his chest. Her eyes widened along with his as she registered his reaction and was overwhelmed with the doubt that had been biting at her heels since he'd left her after issuing this invitation. Had the surgery to remove her emotional failsafe affected her physical appearance somehow? Or had she misinterpreted the appropriateness of flowers for this occasion? Perhaps he'd been about to retract his offer when she'd arrived? When he continued to gaze at her wordlessly, obviously stunned but showing no trace of anger, she plumped for the simplest answer, "Am I early?"

Chakotay gave his head a dazed shake, caught off guard not just by her unconventional entrance but just how captivated he was by the variety of emotions he'd glimpsed in her face in that instant which reflected and magnified his own. "No…" He smiled to himself as he remembered his previous thoughts about her faultless punctuality, "You're right on time." He waited until she'd nodded in relief before allowing himself to ask the obvious question, "Is there something wrong with the door?"

Seven blushed as she shook her head, her eyes flicking between his face to the flowers in her hands and back again. She knew he was amused, but there was no judgement in his voice, just harmless curiosity. "I thought it would be…indiscrete to be seen taking flowers into the First Officer's quarters." She answered honestly, feeling able to confidently hold his gaze.

Chakotay found himself chuckling in agreement, "You're probably right about that." He admitted, even as he felt a protective twinge towards her, in all honesty, looking at her now, he hadn't given a second thought to discretion. He gently placed his hands over hers to take the flowers, "I'd better put these in some water…" She jumped slightly at his touch at first, but allowed him draw the crutch of the flowers away.

Later, she wouldn't be able to clarify the trigger for her actions, maybe being free of the emotional failsafe had exacerbated her impulsiveness, or the heat that surged through her from the unguarded touch broke through her inhibitions and common sense, but he hadn't even turned back to face her properly from setting the flowers aside before she'd grasped his elbow as an anchor to lean forward and kiss him. Whatever surprise he must've felt melted away before she could pick up on it, Chakotay was more interested in prolonging the kiss than questioning it. As Seven let him take over her lead, she loosened his hold on his elbow, her hand instinctively travelling up to his shoulder to curl around his neck. When the need for air reminded her of just what she was doing, she broke the kiss off as abruptly as she'd started it. She took one stumbling step back to disconnect herself, but Chakotay's hands remained a steadying presence around her waist. "I…" She started, keeping her gaze lowered away from his face until she realised that seeing his broad chest heave for breath was equally distracting, "My research informed me that…" She gulped, her tongue numb and her lips tingling uncontrollably, "…that anticipation of the first kiss can lead to…tension." She held her head up high for a moment as she felt her cheeks glow pleasantly from the intensity of Chakotay's gaze, now smouldering with a foreign heat. "I wanted to attempt to alleviate that tension."

Chakotay's hold tightened around her, tilting her towards him as he brought his face close. "That was very considerate of you." He murmured, his fingers fanning out under her chin as he gazed down at her, "What about the second kiss?"

The whispered question caressed her lips as well as her ears, and the shiver that reached the base of her spine told her it was probably rhetorical, but her mind couldn't quite keep up with her body's signals. "I do not know, I would need to search for…" This time it was Seven's turn to be cut off, but like Chakotay before her accepting the kiss came naturally. It developed like a flower exposed to bright sun; Chakotay's hands fell away from her waist to cradle her hip, her light touch on his shoulder slid down to his chest to clutch at his uniform, her other arm coiling around his neck as the kiss continued to deepen, closing the gap between their bodies as one.

They didn't break apart long enough, for mere gasps of air that only seemed to fuel their desire, to be able to distinguish when the second kiss became the third, fourth or one lavish, passionate make out session. Eventually, though it may have been only a few minutes later, the pleading beep of the cooking timer begun to pierce the delicate bubble around them. "Will we still have the 'dinner' component of this dinner date if we continue to ignore that?" Seven murmured wryly, having to duck her head from his in order to speak as Chakotay's deprived lips sought hers out with barely restrained moan.

His long, contented sigh took on a chuckle at the end, "You're the chef between the two of us." He reminded her with a mock frown.

Seven gave him a teasing nip of a kiss in reply, "Not tonight, not if you complied with our definition of this date."

Chakotay laughed huskily as he gave himself a shake and raised his hands in supplication, "I remember, I promise! You'll see what that deal got you if I'm in time." He took the time to keep his hand in the crook of her hip, guiding her into the kitchen with him even as he anxiously snatched up an aged pair of oven gloves and yanked open the oven door with Seven watching his antics in amusement. "There, see…" He pulled out the rescued dish with a sigh of relief as he saw the meal was golden brown rather than singed black, "We didn't need to interrupt what we were doing any earlier…"

Seven smirked at him, "No we did not." She conceded warmly, peering expectantly at their meal. "A pasta bake. It appears to be perfect,"

Chakotay winced slightly, "Reserve that judgement until you taste it. It's not as comprehensive as your picnic, but…"

Seven shook her head, reaching out to touch his hand reassuringly, "I owe a great deal to Neelix in that respect, I relied on his guidance." She admitted ruefully.

"And yet there wasn't a crumb of Leola root in sight." Chakotay quipped, his smile widening as Seven started to giggle, it was an unexpectedly light, easy sound. "That picnic was all you, us." He told her meaningfully before winking towards the brimming pasta dish as he carried it towards the already set table, "This is partially Neelix's doing too though, this recipe was the subject of his second cooking class. The mushrooms and aubergines in it are fresh from Hydroponics."

Seven gracefully sat down at her place at the small, round table, "I will have to pass on a progress report to Mr Neelix the next time I talk to him then won't I? He is anxious that the crew's culinary skills don't slip in his absence."

Chakotay gave a dry chuckle as he served them both a portion then sat down himself opposite her. "I don't know, I think that's pretty much a given. Have you seen Chell's suggested new menu yet?"

Seven's eyebrows arched high, "With 'Red Alert Chilli' as the main special?" She echoed his knowing laugh, "Unfortunately, yes."

"He'll gain his chef-legs soon enough. Chell's a good man, he'll try his best." Chakotay reassured her honestly, watching anxiously as Seven lifted her fork to her mouth, a proud, boyish grin breaking across his face as she nodded approvingly. "How is Neelix doing? You've had more chance to talk to him since he left than I have."

Seven mulled over her answer thoughtfully, "He misses us as much as the crew misses him, understandably, but he is still the happiest I have ever seen him with Dexa and Brax." She smiled ruefully to herself, "He told me yesterday that he knows he made the right choice." Sighing softly, she added quietly, "It is strange how much loneliness can afflict the most unexpected people."

Chakotay swallowed, reaching across the table to take her free hand as he felt his own quiver, "I know." He murmured gently before retracting the quick squeeze to return to his meal. As he did so however, he saw Seven's forehead scrunch up in pain as she sipped her glass of water, "What's wrong?" he immediately questioned, "Is the water too cold or…"

Seven flushed as she shook her head resolutely, "No, the temperature is acceptable, I just…have a lingering headache."

Chakotay studied her in concern, "Maybe I should take you to Sickbay…"

"That won't be necessary." Seven interrupted him sharply, her proudly upright shoulders slumping as she saw him stiffen at her absolute tone. "I have already consulted the Doctor." She admitted shakily, "He operated on the problem circuitry today, before I came here, I am merely suffering some temporary discomfort…"

She jumped as his cutlery clanged against his plate at the word 'operated'. "You had _surgery_?" he forced out harshly, "Why didn't you…"

"I did not want to worry you unnecessarily." Seven pleaded, "It was a component of my cortical node that I once may have required, but has recently caused problems. The Doctor repaired me completely I can assure you…"

Chakotay lifted his hand to stop her, "Seven…" He began thickly, trying to gather his fearfully scattered thoughts, "I don't want to pry, it isn't like that, but I_ would've_ liked to be there for you…"

"I know." Seven cut in with certainty, hardly hesitating before taking his hand tentatively in hers and squeezing it, as much to comfort herself as him. Thinking about the emotional failsafe now not only brought guilt and unease over her use of the Chakotay hologram, which she now knew to be a pale imitation, but also a realisation of how misguided her reaction to its existence had been. Any of her encounters with Chakotay before today's surgery could've killed her, but she'd been too reliant on, too proud of, the Borg detachment which kept her alive but left her hollow. "I wish I could have had you there, but I…was not ready." She admitted regretfully.

Chakotay brought her hand to his lips and kissed the metal capped knuckles tenderly, commuting forgiveness as well as affection in the simple gesture as he met her gaze. "I understand." He murmured, "And if you ever feel ready to tell me what happened…" He didn't need to pull a full explanation from her to know that something serious had happened, she wouldn't submit to surgery, let alone hide it, if it had been a simple malfunction, and over the past couple of months she'd been particularly withdrawn, afraid. "I'm ready and willing to listen."

Seven smiled then, a new calm he hadn't seen before settling on her as she breathed a sigh of relief. "I'm glad." She told him in a sincere, meaningful whisper before her face lightened. "Lieutenants Torres and Paris were returning to Sickbay as I was leaving."

Chakotay's eyes widened, "_Another _false alarm?"

"No, I believe B'Elanna in particular wanted to consult with the Doctor about the possibility of induction, the anticipation of a four day Klingon influenced labour is getting to her, but the Doctor was discouraging."

Chakotay shook his head sympathetically, "Poor B'Elanna and Tom, if this goes on much longer baby Miral will never even get the prospect of a sibling. B'Elanna's already stir-crazy and the baby hasn't arrived yet!"

Seven smiled contemplatively, "I don't know of course, but I believe there's a high probability of them having more children in the future."

Chakotay shot her a curious look, Seven wasn't normally the type to speculate on things like that. "What makes you say that?"

Seven shrugged shyly, "I am attempting to use the idea of 'intuition'." She replied drily.

Chakotay chuckled even as he watched her thoughtfully, "Have you ever considered having children?"

Seven gave a sharp start, "Not seriously." She stutteringly answered.

Chakotay suddenly felt guilty, seeing how he'd wrinkled the comfortable atmosphere between them. "I don't mean anything by it Seven." He assured her hurriedly, "I'm just curious. You've been such a natural with Naomi and the Borg children…"

"No, you are within your rights to ask." Seven responded tightly, "It is not that I've never found the prospect appealing, in fact…" She trailed off, "But I know that it is unlikely, even undesirable considering what havoc my nanoprobes would wreck on a baby, or whether I would survive the process… I would rather be more considerate of any child's needs in that regard than my own selfishness. If I couldn't be certain that I could be a fit and responsible parent to healthy children then I wouldn't take the risk."

Chakotay saw the resigned sadness this conclusion left her with and stood up to go to her. "I understand."

Seven turned glistening, fearful eyes up to him. "Do you?"

"Yes." Chakotay said firmly, "I'm not saying I've never wanted children, but the choices I've made in life, joining the Maquis and everything else too, have prevented it so far and I can accept that continuing." He sighed as he stroked her lovely face lightly, "A lot of people would consider me too old to start now anyway…"

Seven's gaze became clear and piercing. "You are _not _old." She declared resolutely, moving to clasp his hand she still held to her face, "The gap in our ages is irrelevant to me."

"I know." Chakotay murmured fondly. After all, hadn't the pretext for their first date been that he'd realised it was her thirtieth birthday? He would be forty nine in a matter of months. "I need you to hear this Seven, honestly I've believed for years that I…wasn't meant to have a romantic relationship, I'd missed my chances or it just wasn't a road my life was supposed to take but…" He took a deep breath, "I feel different now, about us. I think…I_ know _that we could last. Is that okay?"

"Yes…" Seven choked out, "I never thought that I would have the chance either…" Her voice caught and she turned her face further into his hand.

Chakotay soothingly rubbed her cheek with his thumb, swallowing hard. "Hey, what we should be talking about sweetheart, if we're going to take this chance together, is how we can possibly top this date with our next one?"

Seven's face brightened, her eyes taking on a mischievous, even seductive, glint. "I suppose I could wear a dress…"

* * *

_Personal Log, Seven of Nine, Stardate 57912.6: I have completed a full six hour regeneration cycle as the Doctor prescribed, and an additional three hours of REM sleep in my and Chakotay's quarters. Today I am now twelve weeks and two days into the forty week human gestation period, according to conventional medical wisdom passing the twelve week point and entering the second trimester is considered something of a landmark, the crew has certainly taken it as such. As well as accepting congratulatory expressions, Chakotay and I are now fielding off name suggestions from every crew member we encounter. B'Elanna has assured me that no one was offended when she and Tom rejected such proposals for Miral, so I am dismissing them for now, though I suspect Chakotay finds it amusing. He has relaxed somewhat in the past few days, which I am relieved to see though I wish I could happily share. It seems that my now daily checks with the Doctor are going to continue, despite his having no treatment for 'morning sickness', but I'll admit to being reassured that it is my adapting human physiology, rather than my Borg implants, which seem to be impeding my efficiency for the time being. Not that I am being permitted to work to my full capacity, the Captain has ordered me to merely focus on the MIDAS array transmissions today, with Icheb's assistance, but I suppose it will mean that I am able to read my Aunt's reaction to my pregnancy as soon as her reply to my letter has been received. End log. _

* * *

"Doctor." Seven announced her presence simply as she entered Sickbay to see the Doctor heading towards his office carrying a wide tray of petri-dishes, "If I am disturbing you I can return later…"

The Doctor shook his head as he carefully set the tray down and turned to face her with a reassuring, but slightly strained, smile, "You're not disturbing me at all, in fact I could use a break from examining Vulcan neural tissue."

Seven winced sorrowfully, "Then you are no closer to discovering a new treatment for Tuvok's illness?"

"No closer than I was when he first told me of the symptoms, and that was over two years ago now." The Doctor replied sadly before reaching out a hand to guide her to the nearest biobed, eyes twinkling as he grasped hold of one of the sweeter aspects of being a physician. "Well, how are the two of you this morning?" he asked brightly before allowing a little concern into his tone, "It's not like you to attend your appointments quite so early in the day."

"There will not be _two _of us until my child is born Doctor." Seven pointed out drily, though seeing her hand drift unconsciously over her abdomen, any change in which was hidden by her long wool sweater over forgiving black leggings, softened the reprimand for the Doctor enough to let him grin at her unabashedly. "I thought I should report here early as…" She suddenly grabbed hold of his arm to steady herself as she tried to perch on the biobed, "…I am once again suffering from sensory aphasia."

"Twice in one week?" The Doctor commented as he picked up his medical tricorder, "As I've told you Seven, I'm not particularly surprised, it's most likely connected to the morning sickness and with her cybernetic systems trying to work in tandem with your human ones you're always going to be prone to it if something's off-balance, and pregnancy will certainly cause that." He began to hum along to the beeps of the tricorder as it scanned, "It will probably settle, along with the nausea, as the pregnancy progresses. I'd be surprised if it went on for another week…"

Seven stiffened as he stopped abruptly, another wave of dizziness slamming into her as she took a sharp, fearful, breath in. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing." The Doctor assured her quickly, "Just a slight anomaly in your cortical array. Did you complete a full regeneration cycle last night?"

"Yes, a full six hour cycle and three hours sleep before that." Seven reported.

The Doctor's eyebrows arched up to his non-existent hairline. "Did you and Chakotay actually sleep during those three hours or…"

Seven narrowed her eyes at him, unimpressed by the less than subtle innuendo. "Doctor…" She began warningly.

"I'm just reminding you that I said no strenuous physical activity." The Doctor said defensively before becoming fully serious again, "You have such readings regularly, usually when you're tired or stressed; it's no wonder that it's showing itself now." He squeezed her shoulder reassuringly, "It's always settled down before, so I'm not worried, but in an obstetrics situation we have to be especially vigilant. I'd run the extra scans right now but Tuvok's expecting me in a few minutes."

That was enough for Seven, "You should not disrupt Tuvok's schedule, it will distress him unnecessarily." If anything, this was an understatement, Tuvok had to cling to whatever sense of order he had now to retain his lucidity. The deterioration in his mental state had accelerated over just the past few months. Three weeks ago the Captain, though shaken to her core, had had to take the decision to relieve him of all duties. Harry, promoted to Lieutenant, and Chakotay had been covering his duties as Tactical Officer since that difficult day. Since her own duties had also been reduced, Seven had been trying to spend as much time with him as she could bear, she liked to think her own appreciation of logic soothed him as his slipped away, but in reality it was scant comfort.

"I'll schedule you in for the scans after I've done all I can for Tuvok for the day, but take it easy until then."

Seven exhaled a small sigh, "Chakotay and the Captain are conspiring to make sure I always 'take it easy'." She told him ruefully, but her tone wasn't without appreciation for her husband and her mentor, "Today I will be in Astrometrics relaying with the MIDAS array, and no doubt that Icheb will make sure he joins me there, despite the fact that as a new Ensign he needs experience beyond Astrometrics."

"I doubt it would be a good start to his career if he ignored his First Officer's request, or mine for that matter." The Doctor replied, "And besides…" He added with a soft chuckle, "I don't think it's a bad thing for a 'god-brother' to be a little overprotective."

Seven smiled, blinking back sudden emotion. "I'll need to suggest that prospective title to him, he'd like that." She slid off the biobed and stood more confidently, "Contact me when you are ready to run the scans."

"I will." The Doctor assured her as he gathered up the medkit carrying Tuvok's specific arsenal of medications and followed her out of the door.

* * *

"I would be…honoured." Icheb murmured thickly, the shy smile playing across his lips making Seven see the boy she'd saved and tried to nurture rather than the upright young Ensign standing before her now. He stood taller than her, and had broadened out with muscle since the sparring sessions with Chakotay, undertaken at first as Starfleet combat training, had become a regular hobby. "If you believe that the Commander would also approve…"

"He will." Seven told him confidently, "But we will keep it between the three of us until the baby is born."

Icheb instantly guessed what she was getting at. "You think other crewmembers will vie for similar positions?"

Seven smirked, "If their sense of entitlement over my child's name is…" The sentence stuttered to a halt in her throat as her head gave such a throb of pain that she gasped. When she grasped the console for support, her eyes told her there were four consoles wobbling in front of her.

Icheb gripped her arm anxiously, "Seven?"

"I'm…I'm fine." Seven assured him quickly as the world around her settled as quickly as it had become erratic. Still, she willingly stepped away from the console. "Perhaps you should lead this task."

Icheb nodded in relief, "Of course." He agreed swiftly, moving forward to take her place at the central console, his eyes flicking between that and the reams of data rolling down the main screen.

Seven had barely begun to move back to lean against the wall when the door opened to allow Naomi Wildman to sweep comfortably in. She'd also had another growth spurt recently, though she wasn't yet nine years old her Ktarian/Human hybrid physiology made her physically and mentally in her pre-teen years and already clamouring to begin the Starfleet Academy courses Icheb had already completed. Sometimes it frightened Seven how quickly time seemed to pass, irrational through the feeling was. How long would it be before Miral Paris, and then her own child, would reach a similar stage? Yet, the smile Naomi gave her was still girlishly open, "Hello Seven, I thought Icheb was dealing with the letters and calls to the Alpha Quadrant today?"

"I prevailed upon the Captain to allow me some level of useful activity." Seven replied drily.

"She's tired." Icheb interjected, "As soon as the Doctor as attended to Tuvok she will report to Sickbay."

Seven tilted her head at him slightly to meet his eyes as her brows rose in questioning amusement. "Yes, _sir_."

Icheb however was unrepentant, though his face reddened. "I am merely suggesting that that would be the most prudent course of action."

Seven regarded him fondly, dropping her teasing façade as her head gave another thump in correlation to his words. "Agreed." She conceded quietly.

Naomi looped her arm through Seven's companionably, despite Seven's social advancement through the years her first friend was still one of the people most at ease with the ex-drone. "You're okay though right? Neelix will want to know when he calls."

"You can give him a positive report of my progress." Seven told her warmly.

"Good, and I'm glad you'll be here to talk to him today too because the last time he spoke to me he was compiling a list of names for you and Commander Chakotay to consider. He said a Talaxian name would give the baby a 'taste of his culture'."

"I think this crew has been given enough tastes of Talaxian culture, particularly cuisine, for Seven to teach her child about without giving them a Talaxian name also." Icheb remarked wryly, making Naomi giggle.

"I think I will need to remind Mr Neelix that he already suggested a name for my future children some years ago." Seven recalled, earning intrigued glances from Naomi and Icheb.

"Really?" Naomi asked eagerly.

"What was it?" Icheb pressed, immediately backing Naomi up.

Seven sighed even as a nostalgic smile pulled at her lips, suddenly feeling regretful that she had dismissed the comment so utterly then. "He once advised me that I may like a few Seven of Nine point fives running around me one day."

Icheb was dubious, "He wasn't serious, was he?"

"I highly doubt it." Seven replied firmly.

Naomi however was grinning, sufficiently tickled by the idea. "That would be such a cute nickname though…" She enthused, turning back to Seven for support but her voice instantly faltered as she looked up at her friend's face. "Seven, your nose is bleeding…"

Seven's suddenly vague eyes fluttered open and closed as her fingers slowly drifted up to her top lip and indeed felt blood. "Wh…" She tried to slur out just as her legs collapsed beneath her.

"Catch her!" Icheb cried out as soon as he saw her eyes dramatically roll back into her head, blue streaks of electricity arcing through her facial implants. He and Naomi were both too late to stop the back of her head crashing against the floor as her body crumpled like a puppet whose strings had been abruptly cut. As Naomi, choking back panicked sobs, tried to cradle Seven's head in her lap, Icheb saw that blood was also trickling out of Seven's ears, even as the sparking in her implants began to die down. "Icheb to Sickbay, medical emergency in the Astrometrics lab, activate emergency transport!" He didn't pause to await a reply before slamming his hand against his comm. badge a second time, "Icheb to Chakotay…"

**A/n: Please review. **


	3. The Descent

**A/n: Thank you to NikkiB1972 for beta reading this chapter for me, one which tested the limits of my emotion as well as my writing. This chapter will likely be the darkest of the story, since it covers a lot of issues around the care of critically ill patients. **

Chakotay was straining to run for the biobed before the blurry afterimage of the transport had completely faded from his eyes. "What happened?" he choked out desperately as he saw Seven lying supine, her long frame twisted awkwardly after the rush to get her on the biobed. The Doctor buzzed around her, all intent professionalism but grimly silent other than to issue a bark of a command to Icheb, who was trying to conduct a scan with a medical tricorder even as his hands shook violently and his eyes were visibly filling with stricken tears no matter how frantically he blinked.

Chakotay again tried to move, but his mental shock seemed to be transmitting to his muscles and he barely managed one leaden step before Tom, who with the Captain had also been beamed into Sickbay, held him back, not unkindly, but with an iron grip nonetheless. "What do you need me to do Doctor?" he asked the hologram urgently.

His assistant's voice finally broke the Doctor's focus enough to realise that there were newcomers in his domain. However, his eyes hardly skimmed over the horrified faces of his three crewmates before his attention returned entirely to Seven. "Her cortical array is suffering some sort of cascade failure." He clarified briskly, only addressing Tom, "I need the cortical stimulator I reprogrammed to interface with her cybernetic systems rather than her biological ones."

Tom nodded his head and headed for the equipment bay, tearing its neatly ordered trays apart as Chakotay and Janeway were necessarily pushed further adrift. "Got it." He announced, holding the small device aloft as he gestured to Icheb, taking the medical tricorder from the much younger, and crumbling, man. "I'll take it from here."

"Yes…" The Doctor agreed impatiently as Icheb gladly ducked out of the way and fled to join his Captain and Chakotay. "I need you to attempt to jolt the array, see if we can get her higher brain functions back, she's still breathing for now…"

Tom hurriedly connected the stimulator to Seven's right temple then swung around to the console it would interface with. "What are you going to be doing?"

"The sudden failure caused a build up of pressure in her brain, causing a cerebral haematoma…"

Janeway jumped as she saw Chakotay's knees start to buckle upon hearing those last words, he had to claw at the wall for support as he struggled to catch a breath. If she didn't know him better she'd have thought he was on the brink of passing out, indeed she felt dizzy and nauseated herself. "Is…is that what caused the blood…" She stuttered out faintly as she strained to see her protégé behind the Doctor and Tom's frenzied movements.

"Not directly." The Doctor answered shortly without looking up, "The same pressure that caused the haematoma also caused her eardrums to perforate, some capillaries in her nose to rupture…" He trailed off to glare irrationally at Tom's back bent over the console, "I need that stimulator doing its job lieutenant!"

Tom's fingers, already wildly tapping at the console, grew even more frenzied for a few seconds. "Shocking…now!"

The stimulator gave a single angry buzz that sent a corresponding sizzling surge through Seven's facial implants as her head jerked up then slammed back down on the biobed as her whole body went painfully rigid, except for her back which arched as if trying to heave her body out of the pain. In that instant her eyes flew startlingly open, a whimpering moan escaped her lips with the laboured hiss of gasps from struggling lungs.

Those signs of consciousness, agonising and broken though they were, were enough to make the Doctor and Tom hesitate for the split second that was all Chakotay, revived into action by his wife's cry, needed to reach her. The familiar blue eyes were as dark as a stormy ocean, though her artificial right one was rapidly clouding into sightlessness, the other revealed torturous pain and fear. "Seven!" Chakotay gasped out breathlessly.

Her bloodless lips parted even as her body, her modest pregnancy bump now poignantly apparent, stiffened further in an uncoordinated reaction to the pain. The woman he was used to seeing as soft curves and easily confident stance, now looked somehow brittle, as if something were straining to snap her in half. "Ugh…mmm…" The way she forced out the garbled syllables gave them some meaning and the Captain finally attempted to reach the bedside.

"She's trying to talk…" She told the Doctor in anguish.

"Her vocal processor's failing; it's fragments of random speech." The Doctor explained, "She's not conscious enough to…"

He stopped as, through gritted teeth, another rasping sound left Seven's throat. "Ch…Ch…"

Though really it proved nothing, Chakotay grasped hold of it fiercely, any sense of restraint in this medical situation abandoning him in the face of what he heard as a plea to him. He willed his hand to steady itself as he cupped the side of her face, the contrast between the angry burn of the star shaped implant under her ear and the chilled clamminess of the rest of her skin was stark. "Seven…" He swallowed thickly as he saw the single tear that had been squeezed out of her human eye and trailed a ghostly stain down her greying cheek, mingling with the drying blood from her ear. "I'm here, it's all right, I'm here now…" Hot tears of his own singed his eyes as he reached over and grasped her hand tight enough to make his knuckles turn white, but he held them back, he needed to be strong right now. "You're not alone…I'm here sweetheart…" He realised vaguely that she probably couldn't hear him, but the words poured out anyway.

Seven's groaning quietened under his touch for a moment, but it was a false mercy, her heaving chest stilled also, her head rolling against Chakotay's hand.

"She's stopped breathing, her vitals are failing!" Tom shouted, "The baby's destabilising too!"

The Doctor cursed as he pushed past a stunned and numb Chakotay, who had to be physically pulled back from Seven by Janeway and Icheb. "Trying to restore her higher brain functions has compromised her autonomic systems." He growled out in frustration, "We'll need to perform a controlled shut down, take as much strain off the array as we can just to maintain breathing and cardiac rhythm…"

Icheb was gulping convulsively, his scattering of implants gleaming under Sickbay's brutally bright lighting, making his skin appear even paler. "But the cortical array is wired into everything in a drone…" He whispered, shaking his head uncomprehendingly, "How could it fail? She's already had a replacement node only three years ago…"

Janeway glanced at Chakotay, who was sitting on the floor with his head buried in his knees. He was utterly silent, but his shaking shoulders told a different story. Turning back to Icheb, she regarded him as gently as she could, though her own voice kept cracking as she spoke, "Icheb, Naomi was with you when this happened, right?"

"Yes." Icheb confirmed weakly, guessing what the Captain was getting at, "I didn't allow her to join the transport here. She's with her mother now."

"Good, that's good." Janeway murmured, "I think you should go and see her, try your best to reassure her, or better yet go to the Bridge and tell Harry what's going on."

Icheb rubbed a hand over the implant embedded in his nose, a habit he'd picked up when nervous or exasperated. "With all due respect Captain…" He started tersely, "I cannot report to Ensign Kim because I have little to inform him of, and I am unable to reassure _myself _at the present time!"

Janeway was unperturbed by this generally uncharacteristic, but somewhat expected, outburst. Hadn't they already played out a similar scene when he'd been determined to donate his cortical node to Seven? That was precisely why she felt the need to give him time out of the room, the thought that a connected piece of technology was once again crippling his mother figure must be terrible for the boy, yes she still considered him a boy Ensign's pip or not, to see. "Icheb…" She squeezed his shoulder empathically, "I know this is difficult for you, it is for me too…for all of us, but as your Captain I need you to be strong for now. Your quick actions getting Seven here may well save her and her baby's lives, but you can't do anything else for them right now in Sickbay, alright?"

Icheb pressed his lips together; she could practically see the machinery of Borg logic and restraint kicking into gear in his brain. "Alright Captain." He echoed her awkwardly, "I will do as you ask." He started to turn his head to look at Seven one last time before following those orders, but then he seemed to think better of it and instead stared grimly down at the floor before lifting his chin with a stubborn, denying jerk. Concern softened his face again as he watched Chakotay. "Commander…" He began thickly.

"Doctor, its working." Tom's remark was amplified by relief, but even if it had been a whisper it would've still silenced the room. "Both her vitals and the baby's are stabilising."

"You analyse her human reactions and I'll deal with the technological components." The Doctor's voice also quavered with emotion, but his relief was tempered with the knowledge that they'd probably just got her through the opening stage of a journey through a very dark tunnel with no light at the end yet visible.

Chakotay slowly uncoiled his large frame from his huddled position on the floor, as if he'd been waiting from any sign of hope from the Doctor before daring to withdraw from the shell of numbness that was his only protection. His dim, weary eyes flared briefly with emotion as he met Icheb's ones. He stood up slowly, still grasping the wall for support. "The Captain's right." He whispered, proving that part of his mind at least had been tuned to the conversation. His deep voice was so gravelly and forced that it was almost unrecognisable. He must've seen the doubt and pain in Icheb's eyes as he reached a limp arm over and gripped the boy's shoulder, "Thank you son."

Icheb swallowed hard, the lump visible in his throat as he gulped down. Replying with a single, quick nod, he spun on his heel and fled the room with a drone's marching, mindless strides. The Doctor seemed to wait until the doors had closed behind him before leaving his patient to consult. "As you heard, we've managed to stabilise her cortical array enough to keep her breathing independently."

"But you can't risk trying to wake her up again?" The Captain stated sharply, it was written across the Doctor's face, computer simulated as it was.

The Doctor sighed heavily, "No. As you saw trying to restore the circuitry integrated into her higher brain functions compromised the basic functions essential to life, heart rate, breathing, body temperature…"

The Captain lifted a hand to put a halt to the list, "What about the baby?" she questioned with a glance at Chakotay, surprised he hadn't asked. "I know you claim it's stable for now, but surely she'll lose…"

"Not necessarily." The Doctor cut her off, shooting Chakotay a compassionate look, "We got to Seven quickly enough to prevent a full crash, at the moment the…foetus is in a better state than she is, as long as it can draw oxygen and nutrients from her bloodstream, then…"

"You're making our baby sound like a parasite!" Chakotay snapped brokenly, gasping raggedly for air as the strength of the outburst made his legs wobble unsteadily. "I'm…I'm sorry…" He murmured as even as sorrowful understanding quickly replaced the flash of hurt on the Doctor's face. "She…She was going to come see you this morning, did she decide to go to Astrometrics first?" Even before he saw the guilt in the Doctor's eyes he knew the answer, Seven may have often wearied of her 'maintenance checks', though over the years she'd tolerated them with more forbearance than for example the Captain or B'Elanna ever would have, but she'd been careful to attend every scheduled one and more since her pregnancy had been discovered.

"She did come to see me." The Doctor whispered, "There were some tiny changes in her array but I put off doing deeper investigative scans, I was due to attend to Tuvok…" He flinched back as the Captain reached out for him in understanding, "If such readings were unusual I would've acted quicker, but they weren't. They date back in her medical history for years…" A look of horrified realisation settled on his face but before the Captain or Chakotay could question him on it Tom appeared at the Doctor's shoulder.

"From the scans I've run it looks like her brain's undamaged Doctor, you treated the haematoma quickly." He reported, "All the trouble is in how her cortical array is interfacing with her implants and the dependent biological systems."

The Doctor's fists clenched against his sides despondently. "I thought as much." He muttered bitterly.

"But the stroke…the bleed on the brain, it won't kill her?" Chakotay asked roughly, his dark eyes huge.

"Anything like that would be the least of our problems right now Commander." The Doctor replied tersely, "Although of course keeping her human brain separate from this gives her the best chance…" He stopped as he saw Chakotay's face, regret filling his voice when he spoke again, "I apologise Commander, I didn't think of the bad memories this must…"

"Chakotay?" Janeway queried as the man's hunched back stiffened into straightness and he walked with fresh, painful dignity to the biobed before sinking into the chair Tom hurriedly provided for him. "What's he talking about?"

Chakotay sighed heavily, lacing his fingers through Seven's unresponsive ones. "My mother…she died of a brain aneurysm when I was thirteen." He explained quietly.

She stared at him in stupefied horror, now understanding why he'd almost blacked out upon hearing the Doctor's initial diagnosis. "You…You never told me that." She choked out, "I always assumed that she died with your father during the Cardassian attack…"

"No." Chakotay refuted tersely, "My father was alone when he was killed, and had been for years." Janeway flinched at the bitter, festering guilt in these words, but his next weary, matter of fact statement made her take a full step back. "You never asked, and I never wanted to tell."

The Doctor cleared his throat awkwardly, "I only knew because I have to have a record of every crewmember's family medical history."

"Of course." The Captain dismissed him softly, her eyes on Chakotay and Seven as the former stroked the latter's lifeless face, whether to reach her in her unconsciousness or comfort himself she couldn't be sure. Occasionally he'd kiss her knuckles, an unaffected, habitual gesture between them, as if she were on the verge of waking. She suddenly knew that he'd told Seven all of these things about himself and more, good and bad. She'd seen Seven blossom over the past few years, had realised that the young woman must've unburdened herself of some of her emotional baggage and hang ups, but she'd never really considered that the confidences would flow both ways, that the ex-drone would be able to chase away those of Chakotay's many demons which were too dark for his Captain to have even glimpsed. Of course it made sense now that she saw it; it explained the contentment that had settled upon him and why the couple's devotion was so obviously, though unexpectedly, mutual. "What are your theories Doctor? That the array has reached its shelf life like her original node did?"

"No, if that were the case the failure would've been complete and she'd be dead right now, I wouldn't be able to keep her autonomic systems going. I'm beginning to suspect…" The Doctor halted to move to stand behind Chakotay, "Commander, do I have your permission to break Seven's medical confidentiality? As her next of kin you're the one with the right to…"

Janeway bristled despite herself though she quickly suppressed the reflex. Though she'd made more decisions for Seven's own good more times than she cared to count, but she had to remember that Seven had chosen to give Chakotay that role as her husband. Chakotay didn't need to look away from Seven to know what Kathryn was thinking, even if he'd refused she would've argued, and anyway to shut her out right now would be cruel when she regarded Seven in a similar motherly sense that Seven felt for Icheb. Still, he sighed again, "Yes Doctor. Tell us both what you know."

The Doctor was still apprehensive, "Did Seven ever tell you anything about her emotional failsafe?" he asked Chakotay carefully.

Only then did Chakotay look briefly away from Seven to meet the Doctor's eyes. "Not all at once." He answered reluctantly, "But eventually she confided the whole story about it, though she would've preferred to forget."

"What are you talking about?" The Captain demanded hotly, "What the hell is an 'emotional failsafe'?"

The Doctor looked again to Chakotay for permission, who nodded resignedly, grimacing. "About two and a half years ago, Seven had a medical crisis that I kept confidential according to her wishes." He began solemnly, "Searching for its cause I discovered that there was a failsafe built into her cortical node designed to deactivate drones who reached a certain level of emotional stimulation…"

"Her _emotions_ were killing her?" The Captain forced out disbelievingly, "No, no, that's impossible… I've seen Seven get plenty emotional even in her early months here…"

"I said 'certain emotional stimulation'." The Doctor repeated.

Her eyes widened in horror as his meaning sunk in, "But…but what about Unimatrix Zero? She was with Axum…"

"Unimatrix Zero was an anomaly. Her subconscious mind ruled there, not her conscious one linked to her implants." The Doctor explained further. "But it doesn't really matter, what I'm trying to say is that when I removed the failsafe I had to do some serious rewiring to her array, which was already weakened by the fact that it was using a transplanted node rather than her own…"

Janeway was only half listening, "So you removed this failsafe at once?" she asked pointedly, her face paling further when the Doctor hesitated, "She didn't want it removed did she? That would be just like her…"

The Doctor's face was stony and unreadable. "When she was ready, she did."

Janeway however, rounded on Chakotay like an enraged mother bear. "You should've told me! For God's sake, I think I should know when one of my crewmen is in danger of dying! Were you afraid of what I would say if I found out that you risked her life over a few dates before she decided she'd better get rid of the ticking time bomb in her head?!"

"When she was ready, she made the right decision for herself." Chakotay ground out before exploding to his feet, all of his fear and anxiety boiling over into impotent rage, "If you think that I would _ever _risk…" He stepped closer, his whole body shaking as he got into her face, "You may be our Captain, but that doesn't give you a right to pry into our lives. Whatever Seven tells me is private and I'll be damned if I break my word to her when she's dying…"

Janeway clamped a hand to her mouth as a volatile sob escaped, shaken free by the word 'dying' from Chakotay's lips. "Oh God…" She staggered back as she tried to fight the urge to weep, "This is really happening…"

An animalistic moan of despair from Chakotay echoed her struggling sobs as denial was felled by his own words and he began to buckle under the realisation of what was happening.

The Doctor stepped back, addressing a stricken Tom left adrift in the midst of this deep conversation. "Prepare two doses of sedatives and try to convince both of them to take them, I need to work. I don't intend to deactivate myself until this is over, for better or worse."

* * *

_Chief Medical Officer's Log, Stardate 57919.2: Today marks the first full week of Seven's comatose state. The intravenous feeding tube I inserted on the second day hasn't had any complications, and her pregnancy is still a factor, the baby is growing on schedule. Though this is a…blessing in many ways, it complicates the course of treatment even further. I've come to the conclusion, after spending the week in constant analysis of her array, that it cannot be salvaged to support her higher brain functions. If she's ever going to come out of this coma, which is serving the function of preserving her brain intact, she'll need a replacement array. As noted in my previous logs concerning the failure of her cortical node, transferrable implants are difficult to come by…to say the least. However, I'm beginning to consider unconventional sources. Commander Chakotay has given permission for me to discuss the issues surrounding Seven's possible treatment with the senior officers, since it may well become a tactical and diplomatic mission. I'm conducting that briefing this morning. In addition, I've altered Captain Janeway's prescription for anti-depressant medication, first issued when Tuvok's condition worsened, to reflect the recent stress and have continued to offer mild sedatives to aid sleep. Chakotay, after the emergency sedatives in those awful initial hours, has refused all further medical aid, though he has been sleeping, or trying to, in Sickbay. I'm relieved that he's agreed to include the senior officers in this, he has some difficult decisions to make and will need everyone's support. End Log._

* * *

Kathryn's fingers drummed incessantly on the briefing room table, giving Chakotay's head a frenetic beat to throb to. His own hands were claws on his knees, tearing at any loose threads in the fabric of his uniform trousers rather than bite into his chilled, vulnerable skin. He felt B'Elanna jerk irritably beside him; he didn't need to lift his gaze to his old friend's face to know that she was on the verge of snapping at the Captain to stop that damned noise. A puff of air left her lips to start the rebuke but then she seemed to reconsider, Chakotay could feel her eyes on him again. He shifted, leaning back in his chair but his muscles merely tensed further, well aware of the misleading ploy.

"The Doctor, he's using his comm. channel rather than coming here…" The Captain's voice trailed off, too tightly wound to focus on properly finishing the question.

"He doesn't want to risk leaving Seven unattended right now." Tom replied, "I could go down and relieve him, but I thought…"

Kathryn vaguely reassured him that she was fine with the decision, but Chakotay was hardly listening. Only hours ago he'd been desperate to leave Sickbay behind, just for awhile, but now he wanted to flee back, his heart was racing with dread. He'd always hated this room, none of them liked the layout, cramped, impersonal and hierarchal, Seven had maintained for years that it was 'efficient', but even she had eventually conceded that efficiency didn't make for a pleasant working environment. There was more space now that first Neelix, then Tuvok, and now Seven no longer sat around the table, but if anything it made those remaining seem distant from each other. He had to go back to Sickbay… At any other meeting, either boring or stressful, he'd occupy or calm himself by trying to cheekily catch Seven's eye until she was distracted enough from whatever report she was giving to either glare at him knowingly or laugh. When they'd first started to get to know each other probably, before they'd even firmly crossed the line into dating, her laughter had been so unexpected and exotic that he'd try to commit to memory what he'd said to rouse it from her so he could hear it again. It hadn't taken long for their senses of humour to fall into sync… The heaviness in his eyes, a constant that was left unrelieved by the shedding of tears, morphed into a burning sensation and the lump in his throat wouldn't be swallowed. Any thoughts of Seven sank into the growing black hole inside him, it was ripping him apart, but he couldn't stop thinking of her…

"Chakotay…" B'Elanna's concern softened voice reached his ear as she gently prodded him in the shoulder, directing him to the wall console's screen where the Doctor's strained face had appeared.

The Captain spun her chair sharply to face the Doctor fully, "So, what's your plan Doctor?" she asked bluntly.

The Doctor sighed, "I've come to the conclusion that we're going to have to contact the Borg Resistance for help."

"I'm sorry Doctor…" Harry began tightly, "But how would they help? We already know from Seven's previous problem with her cortical node that implants from dead drones are useless, and no one in the Resistance will be able to donate…"

"I believe that the Resistance may be able to provide a new array." The Doctor answered.

B'Elanna shook her head slightly, "The Borg's priority has never been medical care of their drones Doctor. Seven was…is always quite blunt that drones with major malfunctions are just deactivated."

"That's definitely the case with the Collective." The Doctor agreed, his face twisting into a grimace, "But the Resistance have had to develop new repair techniques to help their members, freed drones like Seven with similar implant dependence and the resulting problems."

"If they have that ability, why didn't we contact them for help when Seven's cortical node failed?" Harry questioned.

"That instance was a different level of failure, absolute. By the time they could've rendezvoused with us, Seven would've died." The Doctor explained, "This situation, the short-circuiting of parts of her cortical array for lack of a better description, is different enough that she'd not in immediate danger of dying. Her basic life sustaining functions are intact, which is why she's still alive right now. However, whenever I've tried to restore her higher brain functions, the ability to talk, walk, understand what's being said to her, the remaining circuits are overwhelmed…"

"…and she crashes." The Captain finished grimly, "Our contact with the Resistance has been infrequent over the years at best Doctor, how can you be sure that they have these…spare arrays?"

"I'm _not_ sure Captain." The Doctor replied frankly, "But four months ago, the last time we established a link with the Resistance, General Korok's vessel to be exact, I spoke to a Vulcan doctor there called T'Nara, she and her associates were making good progress with new techniques to remove implants then stabilise their patients. I was investigating a new treatment for Lt Cmdr Tuvok at the time…"

"You wanted to use Borg technology to bypass the deteriorating parts of his brain?" The Captain guessed.

The Doctor raised a surprised eyebrow at her, "In the simplest terms, yes Captain, but I didn't pursue it any further."

"But you think they'd help Seven?" Tom asked hopefully.

"They'd better." B'Elanna remarked darkly, "She saved their asses by getting us involved. I let myself get assimilated to help them, and so did you Captain, Tuvok too. They owe us. If that General Korok has a shred of honour, then…"

Tom squeezed his wife's hand, "I'm sure he does, he spends his life fighting the Collective. The problem is going to be how far away they are, even with a Borg vessel's transwarp engines…"

"They're due to contact us anytime now." Harry pointed out, "If I put out a continual hail through the MIDAS array then…"

"This leads us to confront perhaps the biggest dilemma." The Doctor began slowly, "Seven's pregnancy is progressing normally, if I could keep Seven in her current state until she's close to full term then there's a good chance her daughter could be delivered not only alive but healthy…"

Chakotay spoke for the first time, "Daughter?" he echoed faintly.

"I know the two of you decided you didn't want to find out…" The Doctor said sympathetically, "But I've had to run so many scans that I…"

"We…We didn't want to find out because we believed there was still a big chance that we'd lose it…her…" Chakotay murmured through barely parted lips, "We were scared I guess, wanted to protect ourselves, not that that's possible. We certainly never thought anything like this…" His voice broke.

The Captain gulped hard, rocking back and forth in her chair for a moment as she tried to summon up the strength to ask her next question. "How much of a chance does the baby have?"

"60%, 65% at most." The Doctor replied quietly, "But I believe that Seven's best chance at full recovery is if we can perform the replacement as soon as possible, and it would be another five months at least before I'd really consider delivering the baby, to avoid disablement and mental retardation."

"So…" Chakotay croaked out, leaning forward over the table, fists clenched as sweat beaded on his forehead. "You're asking me to choose between my wife and my daughter?"

"You wouldn't be alone in this Chakotay…" Kathryn started quickly, her voice cracking in denial of the actual words.

"But it _is _ultimately my decision and I'm the one who's got the most to lose and live with." Chakotay retorted brokenly, "What's going to be next…" His voice expanded to a hoarse, near hysterical, shout, "…that when we decide she's never going to come out of the coma I'm the one whose going to have to give the order to withdraw her feeding tube and let her die of thirst..."

"Don't think like that…" B'Elanna tried fiercely to comfort him.

"I wouldn't let it come it to that." The Doctor stated determinedly, "I'd find the kindest way to let her go…"

"We're not going to talk about this until we've reached out to the Resistance or the baby's born or both!" The Captain demanded sharply, "Doctor, what chance does Seven after to come out of this possible surgery if we did it now versus if we wait for the baby?"

"It's all speculation, we don't know if the surgery I'm talking about is truly feasible." The Doctor reminded them, "But if it was, and we did it now, 35%, if we waited until after the baby was born, 20% to 25%."

"That's half the chance the baby has." B'Elanna murmured, drawing away from supporting Chakotay to curl her arms around herself, "Talking for myself, if it were me and Miral at risk…" Her hold on Tom's hand tightened as he blanched, "I would've given her every possible chance for the sake of 10% on the balance of my own survival." She looked between her own husband and Chakotay, "But I'd have hated to leave Tom with that choice, so…"

Harry gulped hard, "Seven wouldn't be happy about us contacting any of the Borg so directly, the Resistance is in the middle of a war…"

"No, but I think she'd be grateful when she woke up, and no member of this crew would hesitate to take the risk given the circumstances." The Captain murmured, "There's also the fact that the Resistance may have so far to travel that it makes the choice moot, the baby may be born before they arrive to help, but even then Seven would still have a chance…"

"Of a happy ending you mean?" Chakotay whispered.

"Try to hold out hope for them both Chakotay, let us reach out to the Resistance." The Captain pleaded with him.

A strangled sob bubbled at the back of Chakotay's throat, "Kathryn, if I give up hope I don't have much left."

**A/n: Please review. I stretched canon with the story of what happened to Chakotay's mother, she's not mentioned more than once or twice in passing on the show, but I always got the impression, from the focus on his father, that Chakotay was raised in a single parent household, at least by his teens.**


	4. Divided Hearts

**A/n: I don't own Star Trek: Voyager. A big thank you once again to NikkiB1973 for beta reading this for me. **

The lighting in Chakotay's quarters was low, set to draw as little power as possible from the reserves Voyager was still dependent on after the Azirians' final, all-out attack. He may have stumbled on entering this dimness even under normal circumstances; as it was the crutch under one arm and Seven shouldering much of his weight on his other side kept him steady, but Seven still used her free arm to distractedly dial a higher light setting into the room's control pad on the wall before guiding his slow, frustrating shuffle towards his bedroom. "Does this remind you of anything?" Chakotay remarked with a half-hearted, breathless chuckle, frowning down at his feet as he tried to order his healing nerves to control his muscles with the ease he'd thankfully experienced all his life up until two weeks ago.

Seven arched her eyebrow; he sensed the expression rather than saw it. "If you are talking about Ledosia, then I suppose there is a slight resemblance to our predicament then." She answered with a small, but wry smile at the memory, "At least now I don't need to also carry an emergency kit, the Doctor said you should be fine here with no extra provisions…" She trailed off, concentrating on manoeuvring them both so that he could easily lower himself onto the bed.

"And he's right about that." Chakotay assured her, "He wouldn't have released me from Sickbay otherwise." A thrill of relief and pleasure surged through him as he was able to swing his legs onto the bed unaided, with only a small throb of complaint from his muscles. He hadn't been able to do that even two days ago.

"I'll trust his judgement." Seven replied mutedly, her expression still pensive even as she tried to smile at him in reassurance, "He has been proven right that the paralysing effect of the Azirian weapon was only temporary."

"I also remember him saying that it could very well be permanent in my case." Chakotay replied tersely, his stomach beginning to churn again, as it had been when he'd first woken up in Sickbay, barely able to lift his head, his limbs numb and useless as if his head had been transplanted onto another body.

Seven flinched at his tone, the now familiar gleam of hurt shining accusingly out of her eyes before she blinked it back. "I will never forget any of his speculations, I assure you." She finally forced out, a laboured sigh of exhaustion leaving her throat as she suddenly sank down onto the bottom corner of his bed, soon shifting to perch precariously on the edge as she fell into a wary silence.

Guilt consumed Chakotay at once, before she'd even spoken, as soon as the angry words had left his mouth in fact, and her silence now only compounded it. Unlike previous days she didn't try to compensate by hurriedly making him offers of help, of food, of comfort, but then again he didn't deserve them then or now. He was painfully aware that he'd been lashing out at the one person he loved and needed so much. Seven had borne the brunt of his frustration, rage and overwhelming fear at his situation, at his helpless, invalid state. He'd known even at his most overwrought that it wasn't fair, that Seven was the last person who deserved the heat of his impotent wrath, and that had added self-hatred to his toxic cocktail of emotions. Clearing the air between them was entirely his responsibility. "Hey…" He managed to sit up without difficulty and reached over to touch her shoulder, glad that she'd didn't flinch away from his touch, but she didn't relax into it like usual either. "I owe you a huge apology for how I've been acting since all this happened…" He let his fingers lift to brush her chin, hoping to get her to turn her face towards him again. "Quite frankly I've been an absolute asshole." He admitted with blunt, uncompromising honesty.

Seven's face quickly spun to face him, wide-eyed. "Do not say that, you were afraid." She told him firmly, but then bit her lip as she looked down. "I know myself well enough to realise that I would've acted much more deplorably if I had been in your position."

"That doesn't excuse how I acted." Chakotay persisted, "Even if everyone in the universe would understand why I was lashing out, it still doesn't excuse anything." He stroked her worryingly pale face with the back of his hand over and over as he continued, "I've hurt you, and that's the last thing I've ever wanted to do to you Seven."

Seven didn't deny that, though she still lowered her face further so that he couldn't read her expression completely, taking hold of the hand he had pressed to her cheek to clutch it in her lap. "I was hurt when they shot you; I thought you had died…" Her whole body shuddered as her breath caught on the sob she choked back, "When you woke up I was so relieved, but then you discovered the paralysis and began to resist me…" She heaved a deep breath and raised her head, her shimmering eyes staring piercingly into his, "It felt like you were rejecting me." She revealed quietly.

Chakotay inhaled sharply, feeling as if he'd just been kicked in the chest. "No, no…" He began to repudiate her passionately, but then reconsidered as he saw resignation present in her face. "I wasn't rejecting _you_ Seven, not like that, never, but…" He stopped, "I was in a dark place, those first few days, when the paralysis wasn't lifting as quickly as the Doctor thought it would, I started to believe that I would be crippled for life, that I would never walk again or even have full use of my arms. I _hated _the idea of you feeling obligated to be my nursemaid for the rest of our lives together…"

"And so you pushed me away." Seven finished shortly, hardly bothering to wipe at the tears streaming from burning, red eyes as her own fear and anger resurfaced, "Did you think I would leave you? That I wouldn't love you anymore? Do you think me so inconstant…"

Chakotay swallowed hard, dragging his still sluggish body around until he could embrace her from behind. "No, I didn't doubt you, that's what scared me, I would've owed you so much, even more than I do just in loving you." He sighed as he remembered visions of his future self during his most tortured nights alone in Sickbay, imagining himself bedridden with Seven, still young, beautiful and able, fretting over him but growing resentful, wasting the life she'd had to fight so hard to have. "It wouldn't have been right to ask so much of you…"

"Not right?" Seven echoed incredulously, "You are noble to the point of self-destruction Chakotay, and it would've destroyed me too." She told him sharply before she became more introspective, "I love you, it would've been difficult and I'm glad we seem to have avoided it, but we would have adapted to our new circumstances." Her voice shook as she asked another poignant question, "You don't trust me?"

"I wouldn't have fallen in love with you if I didn't trust you utterly, you know that sweetheart." Chakotay countered softly, "I think this has more to do with me not being able to handle being helpless and dependent than with anything to do with you."

Seven sighed ruefully and finally leaned on his shoulder, "Then we are more alike than the crew suspects we are." She murmured.

Chakotay bristled, he was always trying to keep Seven as oblivious to the ship's gossip as she had been when she'd considered it the utter irrelevance it was. "Our relationship is no one else's business…" He huffed.

Seven kissed the side of his face to calm him, "I know." She agreed quickly, "But I fear that I would react worse if I were to become a burden to you. You know now how I acted when I discovered the emotional failsafe…"

Chakotay winced, any mention of that time bomb still filled with disbelief and horror at the Borg Queen's complete sadism, or perhaps more pain that it had proven so effective in its purpose, for awhile at least. "I understood that. Yes, it was a terrible risk to ignore it, but you were…"

"Scared, as you were in Sickbay." Seven finished, her voice so thick that he could barely understand her next words, "There could be more health problems for me, my optical implant could fail, I'd be blind in one eye, _I _could easily lose the ability to walk or I could suffer any number of life-ending failures. Perhaps it is unfair for me to ask you to commit, I know the Captain brought up the same concerns to you when we first informed her about our relationship…"

"She did." Chakotay replied tightly, recalling how angry and violated he'd felt when Kathryn had honestly questioned whether his love for Seven went as far as it might one day need to. "And I told her that if anything, God forbid, went that far, we'd face it together, we'd…adapt like you just told me." This time he took her face in both of his broad hands without hesitation and kissed her softly and tenderly for a long moment before murmuring against her lips, "I'm sorry if my actions when the positions were reversed made you doubt that for even a second, but I'm telling you that if you try pushing me away I'll push back just as much as you have been for me these past few days, okay?"

"Okay." Seven agreed, a real smile pulling at her now rosy lips as she kissed him back. "It would be best if we could remind each other, without arguing." She told him with a slight smirk as she gently pulled him down to lie on the bed and joined him, laying her head lightly on his chest, her own heart slowing to a more regular rhythm as she heard his thudding soothingly away under her ear.

Chakotay chuckled regretfully, "I never thought we'd be able to compete with Tom and B'Elanna in having arguments, but it seems that we can." He pressed his lips to the top of her head in silent apology, "But I guess it's healthier than bottling up strong emotion." As Seven nodded against his chest, he remembered their shared reputation for reserve, of hating conflict. He knew in his case he'd never really been able to be open about something that was upsetting or angering him with anyone on the crew. He felt too strong a sense of responsibility towards those under him to do anything but stay detached for his own sanity, and with the Captain, though they'd had their share of bust ups; they'd always been futile because they'd both been aware of her ultimate superiority in the hierarchy. Seven was perhaps the only person he'd shared a level emotional playing field with in years, and that made her all the more precious. He picked up her human hand; the one curled around his shirt, and kissed the knuckle of her ring finger, just below where her engagement ring snugly fitted. "Are you sure you still want to marry me?"

Seven, showing agility which put his to shame right now, carefully rolled onto him, one leg either side of his hips and her elbows under his arms as she leaned in for a very deliberate kiss. "I've never been surer of anything." She replied fervently, "Tonight has certainly reaffirmed my commitment to 'in sickness and in health'."

"Maybe that's why I went through this paralysis, I'd like to think there's a reason for everything." Chakotay said thoughtfully.

"I don't care about reasons…" Seven admitted as she buried her face in the crook of his neck, "I am just relieved that you are alive and regaining your strength." She felt tears prick at her eyes again, but didn't let them fall onto his warm skin, instead leaving a trail of soft kisses along the inside of his throat.

"I'm relieved too, believe me…" Chakotay began before the words were strangled in his throat by a groan of desire. "Damn it though, I wish I could recover completely a little faster…" He ground out huskily.

Seven smirked at him in amusement, "You're underestimating your abilities, as well as mine."

Chakotay gave a throaty chuckle as he indeed felt his body respond eagerly to her provocative position. "As soon as…" He laughed against Seven's full lips as she interrupted him with a kiss, "As soon as I can stand up with you in front of the Captain, let's get married."

Seven looked up into his face in surprise, "With no irrelevant…fuss?" she asked hopefully as Chakotay reached around the back of her head to pull her hair down to her shoulders and began to run his fingers through it.

"You might find you like the fuss of a wedding, but whatever you want honey." Chakotay humoured her knowingly, hugging her close and feeling her quiver with emotion. "We're never going to be able to predict what's going to happen in the future Seven, but that fact doesn't change our feelings right now, today. I love you."

"I understand." Seven whispered, "And I love you."

* * *

_Captain's Log, Stardate 58122.4: The optimistic turn things have taken for Seven since we finally managed to make contact with the Resistance on New Year's Eve has taken a strange turn with Korok's latest message. He reports that many in his group are suggesting that the plan of them merely sending a schematic of a cortical array and instructions on how to replicate it would be the quickest way to revive Seven, that being comatose for the months it will take them to reach us will cut her chances of survival. They don't add, though I sense it's a factor among the ones who didn't know 'Annika' through Unimatrix Zero, that diverting resources, vessels, to help us will make them vulnerable in the fight against the Collective. I can understand that, of course I can, but thankfully Korok seems to be committed to truly helping us. However, he did make an awkward request of me today. Axum wants to speak to Chakotay. Apparently its possible, using several Borg Cubes and then our link with the MIDAS array as relays, but I don't know if I should allow it, possible or not. I offered to speak to him myself, but Korok said he insisted that he speak to the person ultimately responsible for Seven's care, and that's Chakotay now. I don't know what to do. I know Axum, I witnessed the depth of love he had for her, though it was for 'Annika' who wasn't the Seven I know, not entirely, and she certainly wasn't Chakotay's wife. I can't help but feel he deserves closure and input as much as any of us, but does that feeling give me the right to push this on Chakotay? _

* * *

Janeway jumped, her coffee sloshing in its mug, as her Ready Room doors hissed open, the sound grating on her already aching head. She spun around so quickly she was dizzy for an instant, but she forced herself to recover as she saw Chakotay and tried to smile at him. "Chakotay, thank you for coming…" She grimaced as the greeting sounded unnaturally formal even to her own ears.

Chakotay stared at her, his eyes clouded with exhaustion as he squinted at her, as if deciding whether it was worth calling her out. "What's wrong Kathryn?" he asked hoarsely, running a hand over his face, which was speckled with reddened cuts from shaving with shaking hands.

She gulped, her shoulders slumping as her fingers tightened nervously around the cooling mug. "We received another message from General Korok."

"They're not coming?" Chakotay's voice cracked as he strode towards her.

"No, no, they're still on their way!" Kathryn assured him, "Korok seems very committed, but he did have a request." She reached for his arm, held tight to his side, and squeezed his elbow, "Axum, from Seven's experience in Unimatrix Zero, he wants to talk to you."

"I know who he is." Chakotay cut her off, a muscle jumping violently in his jaw before he turned his face sharply away from her, "Is this…conversation a condition of them helping Seven?"

"No, I think they'd be offended if you saw it like that Chakotay." Janeway answered with conviction, "Especially Axum. But still we might've underestimated the complexity of the Resistance's organisation…"

Chakotay stepped back from her, though to her relief only so he could sink onto the couch. "Some of its members aren't sure how far they should go to help us." He concluded, head bowed, "They're not a Collective anymore, of course there's division. Seven always said that would be as difficult to conquer as the Collective would be."

Kathryn nodded in solemn agreement, "She would know better than us, but maybe with a great leader… Korok believes Axum could be that leader, disparate though their ships are through the galaxy. I certainly saw those qualities when I met him, and apparently his contingent in the Beta Quadrant has been particularly successful, but hearing about Seven has devastated him by all accounts. Korok believes that if we fulfil his request and bring him directly into the loop, then he'll be able to convince the wavering minority to support Korok's efforts to break off from his fight against the Borg to rendezvous with us." She twisted her hands in her lap as she joined him on the couch, her eyes boring into him as she pleaded for his understanding, "I offered, emphatically, to speak to him myself, but…"

"He wants to speak to me." Chakotay finished, "If I were in his position I might feel the same." He murmured.

"I think you're right." She replied, peering at him intently as she tried to tread carefully, "I think you could understand each other, share empathy. I know…Unimatrix Zero was a unique situation, but from what I saw his and Seven's feelings for each other were genuine and of six years standing." She saw him stiffen and jumped to assure him, "That doesn't diminish what Seven feels for you now…"

A ghost of a smile appeared eerily on Chakotay's haggard face, "I don't need to be reassured that Seven loves me Kathryn, she's never made me feel insecure about that, even when she confided to me about Axum and Unimatrix Zero early on."

"She did?" Janeway said softly, though this ordeal had given her enough of an insight into her two friends' intensely private relationship that she wasn't too surprised. "If you are going to talk to Axum I need to warn you that the Annika he knew, Seven's Unimatrix Zero alter ego, wasn't the Seven we know, certainly not as she was back then and not even now." She sighed thoughtfully, "It wasn't that I didn't see Seven in her at all, she recognised and knew me, remembered Voyager, but…" She bit her lip, feeling disloyal to her protégé as she continued, "But she was so different too, so _human_. It was as if the Borg had never assimilated her, like stepping through the looking glass into a universe where those 18 years with the Collective could be forgotten and replaced with happier memories…" She pressed her fingers to her stinging eyes, remembering the feeling akin to grief she'd experienced when she'd realised that human girl, comfortable in her own skin, would be destroyed along with Unimatrix Zero. Of course what they were all going through now in anxiety and _pre-emptive _grief for Seven, and her daughter too, put that lingering regret into painful perspective.

"She once told me that being in Unimatrix Zero was like being in a dream, watching herself live out a fantasy but not quite living it." Chakotay murmured, seeing the Captain nod out of the corner of his eye, "Seven of Nine's past with the Borg is part of who she is, and that person is as human as the rest of us." He declared passionately, "If every one of those Resistance members had humanity as resilient as hers is, they wouldn't be questioning whether she's worth saving!" He gasped for air as Janeway tried to rub him soothingly on the back.

"I didn't tell you about this to add to your stress Chakotay, honestly. I'll let Korok know that I'll talk to Axum myself. He deserves some compassion, but it's not your problem…"

"Anything that risks the Resistance withdrawing their help _is _my problem Kathryn." Chakotay replied harshly, springing up from the couch. "And Seven would want…" His mouth set in a thin line as he left the rest unsaid. "Permission to leave?"

"Granted." Janeway replied quietly, suddenly certain that she never should have brought this up with him, "But I don't think Seven would want you to be hurt anymore when…"

"That ship has sailed." Chakotay broke in sharply with a weak shrug, feeling an irrational anger surge through him as if she'd just suggested he give up on Seven altogether. "And maybe you'll be right and Axum and I will understand each other, we both fell in love with the same woman after all." With that saddened pronouncement, he turned and walked straight back out onto the Bridge.

* * *

Tom grimaced, then promptly felt guilty at his reaction, as he left the Doctor's office to find that Chakotay had taken up his pilgrimage to Seven's beside several hours earlier than usual. Since her condition had stabilised into this coma, two months ago now, Chakotay had been working as many shifts as he could fit in the day and then retreating to Sickbay at night before starting the cycle again the next morning. Not that the Captain hadn't tried to lessen his workload, he manned the Bridge without having to be mentally present, she made sure there was always an officer there with him. That was why it had set alarm bells off this morning when he'd been called into the Ready Room, since the Captain didn't consult him much with ship matters anymore, it could only mean that the Resistance had met with another complication in their journey to bring medical aid.

He was gripping his wife's lifeless hand so hard now that Tom felt that if Seven were conscious she'd be grimacing in pain. Chakotay was staring beyond her, not really even focusing on the wall, but still noticeably avoiding looking at her stomach, which had bloomed over the past few weeks despite everything. B'Elanna had been glowing at that stage, settled into her new condition but not yet grossly uncomfortable. The comparison before him made Tom shudder to a halt on his way to them. Hadn't he promised himself that he'd try not to see B'Elanna in this? It was hard enough seeing Seven, who he'd developed a real brotherly affection for over the years, in this condition without putting his own beloved wife in her place, and thus himself in Chakotay's. "The Doctor's working on the holodeck, but I can call him back if…" He began awkwardly.

A shiver ran down Chakotay's back at the sound of his voice as if a cold draft had blown over him. "No, if he's working on another…treatment, let him be." He replied heavily.

Tom winced and was glad Chakotay had his back turned to him. He doubted Chakotay would be content with the Doctor's work if he saw it; the hologram himself was alternating between rage and despair, offended by the Resistance's most recent suggestion that they could just send him replicator instructions for an array. Didn't they realise how inadequate Voyager's technology was when it came to such a complex component? Couldn't they guess he'd already tried it? Though he'd demanded to the Captain that the Resistance doctors had to come to Seven themselves, he'd begun to run scenarios again. That meant preparing for the fact that the baby might need to be born as soon as she could viably survive, 24 weeks, still almost a month away. Tom had understood the Doctor's reluctance then, if Seven's daughter was born that early, even in their 24th Century Sickbay, she'd only be alive in the most clinical of terms, perhaps in an even worse state than her mother was now. The night he'd heard that scenario in detail, he'd almost broken down tucking Miral into bed. He cleared his throat when he saw Chakotay zone out again, gesturing towards the battered handful of flowers stuffed into a ceramic vase by Seven's biobed. "Miral insisted that I bring those flowers she picked up from Airponics for Seven."

It took a few seconds for Chakotay's gaze to drift vaguely to the flowers before returning intently to Seven. "Thank her for us." He finally said with quiet warmth. "She's a little sweetheart."

Tom chuckled, "I wouldn't say that, after all, Seven's always been the only babysitter who could get her into bed without a tantrum worthy of the runner- up at a Bat'leth competition."

Chakotay's lips flicked briefly upwards, "She still threw tantrums with her, Seven's just better at ignoring them than the rest of us."

"I'll need to tell B'Elanna that one."

Chakotay nodded distractedly and there was a long silence before he abruptly asked, "Do you remember when I was shot and paralysed?"

Tom's eyebrows rose, "During the three month descent into the hell that is Azirian space? How could I forget?"

"After that, she…she warned me about _this_." Chakotay choked out emphatically, waving a shuddering hand over Seven's still body.

Tom frowned uneasily, "What do you mean? About her cortical array specifically?"

Chakotay grunted impatiently, "No, just about her physiology, her health in general. She was worried about how I would feel if something…" His lips curled in as he stooped further over the bed, "But I told her I was willing to risk that, that fear about the future wasn't a good enough reason to give up something so good, that we'd face things together…" He took another painful pause, "But she's not here with me now, not really, so I was wrong…"

"No, you weren't." Tom cut in, "But maybe you were both right. You are suffering right now because she is, but you the two of you have been happy and you can be again. Thinking back to all the trouble with the Azirians, you and Seven got married as soon as we left that region, if that doesn't make the point I don't know what will. I know we all still remember the reception…"

"We weren't going to have a party originally, but then we thought we owed the crew a morale boost." Chakotay recalled before his voice hardened again, "Now I need to talk to Axum, that's what the Captain had to tell me."

"Axum?" Tom echoed, wracking his brains, "Is that another…friend from Unimatrix Zero?"

Chakotay, with his elbows on the biobed, put his face in his hands for a moment. "If you had any idea what that…place did to wreck her self-esteem even further back then you wouldn't call any of them friends…" He muttered before shaking his head in shame, "No, that's not fair…"

"I thought it was that Klingon, General Korok, who was coming to help us?"

"It is." Chakotay answered shortly, "Axum is in a Cube on the fringes of the Beta Quadrant, millions of lightyears away, yet apparently the Romeo half of Unimatrix Zero's own Shakespearian tragedy speaking on his Juliet's behalf is more convincing to some members of the Borg Resistance than me pleading for the lives of _my _wife and _our_ baby!" He was yelling now, having staggered back over the biobed as his whole body heaved with hot, enraged tears.

Tom could do nothing but move to stand stoically beside him, grasping his shoulder in support. "When do you have to speak to him?"

Chakotay sighed as he crept back to the biobed. "Tomorrow morning." He answered, "How am I supposed to face him when it's only been two months and I feel like I can't live like this anymore?" he asked without expecting an answer, his voice dropping to a broken whisper, "When I'm so angry that I can hate her for minutes at a time?"

"Listen…" Tom began thickly, "When B'Elanna asks you over for dinner tonight, say yes for once, get this all off your chest and eat something. You can stay on our couch for the night, have some breakfast, and then we'll deal with this Axum guy in the morning, alright?"

Chakotay blinked at him, his mind slowly clearing. "Thanks Tom."

"Anytime." He assured him immediately before moving to go to the equipment stand, "I need to check Seven over and monitor the baby. The Doctor told me you don't always like to stay to hear her heartbeat and see the scan, but…"

"I'm staying this time." Chakotay confirmed resolutely.

**A/n: Please review.**


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